THE world looks a lot more ordered from the 19th floor of Divis Tower.
There’s a single wee widow of wired glass on the top-floor staircase that looks down on the Falls Road and all the way across to the mountain which gave the tower its name. The views from the five flats on this floor must be incredible – it was still impressive through the thick window on the stairwell, with St Comgall’s directly below, St Peter’s twin steeples on the left and the Belfast Hills in the distance framing the whole scene like a sleeping giant. From the top of Divis Tower, the city stretches out before you like a massive magic carpet.
This floor, along with the one below and the roof above, was occupied by the British army for three decades and for many of those years they could only access it by helicopter. It’s hard to imagine what the residents had to go through. Today, its 96 flats are kept in pristine condition and are much sought after. They must be brilliant birdwatching stations. Some birds love tall buildings, treating them as they would cliffs.
Ravens have recently moved into downtown Belfast. Dúlra noticed a pair on UTV’s new offices in City Quays opposite the SSE Arena, and last year another pair nested on Belfast City Hall. They would certainly be interested in settling down on Divis.
But the king of the high-rises is the peregrine falcon – an falcún gorm – the world’s fastest bird. Dúlra has always found it difficult to definitively identify it and without good binoculars (and even with them), it looks like a soaring kestrel or sparrowhawk. They breed in Belfast in some of our quarries and a few years back on the Harland and Wolff cranes, picking off pigeons at will. Imagine seeing the fastest bird in the world zooming past your living room window! Now that would be something truly special for the residents of Divis – and they wouldn’t even need binoculars!
But it was the area below the tower that had caught Dúlra’s attention as he strolled into town this week. Here, even in the heart of urban Belfast, nature is being nurtured. The residents of Divis Tower have created a small community garden adjacent to the entrance. And it’s an oasis of tranquility amid the pandemonium of city life.
ZEN OUT OF ZEN: The residents of Divis Tower have made a beautiful and restful little garden
Squeezed between the tower and other homes, it’s the type of space so close to the city centre that would normally be turned into yet another car park. But, thankfully, this wee corner of prime real estate was given over to nature and dedicated by the people of the tower to former resident Brendan ‘The Dark’ Hughes.
It’s clear that it’s well used – there’s even a couple of mini-greenhouses here where residents are growing house plants. Benches are placed all around it and Dúlra could see the withered shoots of daffodils, which will burst into colourful life once more in spring.
But what made this wee spot truly special were the trees. On one side cherry trees have been planted and they were heavy with fruit. Dúlra would put money on them attracting Ireland’s most stunning visitor, the waxwing, which, when it occasionally arrives from Scandinavia during the coldest winters, somehow prefers to feed on city streets rather than in the countryside. The Divis offering of bright red cherries would be irresistible. Opposite the cherries stood the biggest tree of all, a beautiful Scots pine standing at the entrance like a guardian of the garden.
Dúlra took a seat on one of the benches and simply relaxed – being surrounded by greenery slows the heart down. In a few minutes, the din of the Falls Road traffic seemed to fade as though it had been turned down by remote control.
A squawk caught Dúlra’s attention – was it coming from the pine? It was certainly an unfamiliar call and he followed it... right to the open window of one of the tower residents. It was a pet parrot in a cage!
But the next bird calls he heard were certainly coming from the mighty pine. A flock of blue, coal and great tits had suddenly arrived, from where he had no idea. But they were in their element in this tree, acrobatically hanging off cones and teasing out microscopic insects. To these birds, this wee garden in the middle of a concrete jungle is like an oasis in the desert.
When Dúlra finally got up to leave and continue on his way to the city centre, he had a spring in his step. And he realised that this community garden had managed to do something magical – to connect Divis to the mountain in the distance it had been named in honour of.
• If you’ve seen or photographed anything interesting, or have any nature questions, you can text Dúlra on 07801 414804.
